1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a smart card interface. More particularly, the present invention relates to arranging a battery pack having a dual-type smart card interface for both a contact/non-contact subscriber identity module (SIM)-type smart card and an ID-1 type smart card.
2. Description of the Related Technology
In conjunction with wide spread use of the cellular phone, some mobile service providers have developed a financial transaction service, which is a new kind of profitable model, as well as a content download service. The method developed for the mobile financial transaction service uses the inherent number or the telephone number of the cellular phone and levies a charge for the financial transactions together with the charge for the mobile communication service. However, because the cellular phone still lacks in proper security, the aforementioned method cannot provide the requisite assurance that is required during financial transactions.
Accordingly, the mobile service providers and the financial companies want to incorporate the smart card into the cellular phone for maximum security of the financial transaction. The mobile service providers have tried adopting the SIM-type smart card, which has a small size dimension, for various uses of electronic money (e.g., “eCash”), a credit card, and an RF-type traffic card, while the financial companies have tried adopting an ID-1 type smart card, which has same size dimension of a conventional credit card, for use in an ATM and as an RF-type traffic card. However, complicated technical problems still exist to put both the SIM card reader and the ID-1 card reader within the cellular phone in order to meet both groups' requirements.
A cellular phone having a non-contact SIM card reader and an inside antenna was introduced in Korean Patent Publication Gazette No. 2000-0036900 “Cellular phone having RF antenna” and No. 2001-0077791 “Mobile communication terminal having SIM card”. However, with the trend of making a light-and-slim cellular phone, it is difficult to reduce the dimensions of other modules of the cellular phone and combine the functions of modules in order to contain the SIM card and reader. To resolve the aforementioned problems, the following device was introduced.
A battery pack that provides enough space by mounting a SIM card reader on the battery pack was introduced in Korean Patent Publication Gazette No.2000-0003372 “A SIM card attached within a battery pack” and Korean Utility model Registration Gazette No.20-0251132. However, these devices relate to the original functions of the SIM card for providing compatibility with various mobile communication networks, and are limited to the non-contact type SIM card that can communicate with the cellular phone only. The RF communication devices using a non-contact type SIM card in the aforementioned devices use C4 and C8 contacts coupled to an RF antenna for wireless communication, however, this configuration has already been introduced by SLC, Inc. Moreover, since this configuration uses C4 and C8 contacts, which are reserved for other use, other applications using C4 and C8 contacts cannot be made any more.